Hope
by Miss Pennyfeather
Summary: Tonks knows it's wrong, but she hopes, because Remus has given her something to hope for. R&R please.


_Hope_

*

I think that when you're bitten, you feel you have a disease you can't cure. You might prolong your life, but you will live with this burden on your shoulders, until the day you die. You have double responsibilities when you are infected. You must not infect anybody else.

You've lost part of yourself in that battle with the monster. Part of you has been stolen and replaced with a creature that doesn't know anything about you. And you have to coexist with that creature and it's hard because you just want to destroy it, but then you'd destroy yourself.

This self-hate you feel can only be ailed through others. If you feel useful, if you feel like you're helping, if you feel like you're fighting and loving things aren't hopeless. You think that you deserve another chance.

Your life is a secret. If you want a real life you have to hide who you are, since no one will want to make your life wonderful if they know what you are.

But I want to make _his_ life wonderful. I know what he feels and I want to help him. But he won't let me. I am lucky. I can morph into anything I want and get rid of my real self when I feel like it, but he can't play pretend like that.

I wish he at least looked at me when we talk.

I sit here next to him and I feel him trying to run away, to bury himself in those papers. I pour coffee for him and try to tease him, but he's just not that guy. He thinks I am pretty young to be in the Order. I sometimes touch his hand and he doesn't do anything. He doesn't shrink away but he doesn't take my hand either. He just doesn't react.

Sometimes I want to ask him things about his childhood, before he got bitten. Sometimes I want to ask him where he got bitten and all these personal things that make him who he is. But I'd be causing him unnecessary pain and I'd probably not find out much. That's what I like about him. He doesn't try to be unknown. He just is.

I am like an open book. I think he knows everything about me and not just because we're friends. Everyone knows everything about me. There are very few things that I keep for myself and loving him is one of them.

Have you ever felt happy just to be around the person you love than to lose him altogether? I was just glad he was there.

I know he couldn't – there couldn't be anything between us. He's a mature man and I'm a little girl and he believes in social conventions and I hate principles and – we're different.

But I can't stop it. I really believe we could sit in each other's arms on a Sunday afternoon on the balcony and eat cake or tell silly stories.

Nothing else would be important; like the war, the Order, even magic.

We'd just be normal for a change or at least for an hour or two.

And it hurts to want something with your entire being, because you know you'll be disappointed, but you do it anyway.

I'm worried about my mother and father and my loved ones and I'm worried about all my friends and acquaintances, but I'm most worried about him. I need him. Without him, this entire place is nothing but crammed space. When he's around, everything has an order and the little things that don't matter shine.

Tonight we're traveling to the Burrow, but he's silent and thoughtful.

'What is on your mind?'

'I'm thinking about Harry,' he says.

'He's fine. He's there.'

'How do you know?'

'It's Christmas. It's the loveliest time of the year. No one can be in danger right now.'

'That's a nice way of thinking, but I wouldn't count on it.'

'I was just trying to cheer you up, you know.'

'Oh.'

The moments with him are priceless, when I have all his attention. He's so wrapped up in his eternal dispute that he can't notice my intentions.

'I guess I didn't succeed.'

'These aren't happy times, let's say,' he replies.

'They could be. I mean if we let everything be gray then the enemy has already won. Don't you think?'

'I shall always trust you to have hope for all of us,' he says smiling.

And then like always, when we're alone, I can't help myself.

'Why can't we be together?'

'Because we can't Nymphadora.'

'Tell me again, I don't understand.'

'You act as if you didn't know me when I have made it clear to you who I am. I am not the brave man Sirius was and I can't be. I am afraid, very much afraid.'

'You are just as brave as…'

'You are mistaken if you think that I shall risk everything for emotions. I am afraid and shall always be. I've lived in fear all my life. The only brave thing I am doing is not letting this happen to you.'

'I don't need you to protect me. I want to protect _you_.'

'You can't protect me and you know that very well. You just feel you _could_ stand it all since you have no idea what it's really like. You're blinded by your affection.'

'I want to be like my mother and take my chances,' I tell him defiantly.

'Your mother didn't have to deal with someone like me. I know how the story would go. You would get hurt many times and bear it bravely. At one point you wouldn't stand it anymore but you'd feel ashamed to tell me so I would have to leave you to spare you.'

'No, you're wrong. Loving you is pain but it's beautiful pain that keeps me alive and…'

'Enough! You are a young girl who fell for the troubled older man. It will pass.'

'It will never pass, because the young girl will always be a young girl and you will always be a troubled older man,' I tell him dejected.

'Nymphadora. You need to find happiness. You deserve happiness with someone else. Let me be what I am.'

'I've already found my happiness and you're the only one taking it away from me. You do it daily.'

Remus stops in the snow and takes a hard look at me because he isn't quite sure why I persist and he isn't quite sure if I am being honest or just kind.

'I am sorry…I am sorry Tonks.'

It's worse when people tell you they're sorry. They don't love you, they don't resent you, they're just sorry. You'd like them to spit on you, curse you, choke you with kisses, not regret the moments when they were with you.

'You always end it like that, with an apology. Whenever we talk about it. Tell me the _truth_. Be brutally honest. I can take it. Just be honest, for crying out loud!' I retort breathing hard. 'Just tell me what is in your head.'

Remus feels like someone pointed the gun at him. He starts walking again slowly, very slowly.

'There's not much to say that you already don't know. You know what is in my mind. I wouldn't be so adamant in my words if my mind was clear of you. When I was younger I used to need all my friends around me to feel I was really there. I needed them in order to know I was still alive. I only felt safe in the Shrieking Shack. But, it's true…with you I don't need anyone else. And that's why we can't be together.'

He walks on without a general direction and I walk with him, holding his hand partially. He doesn't react as usual.

We _are _normal, we are like everyone who has loved.

I will wait for him forever, because I have the most precious gift of all: hope.


End file.
